Duality
by midnight glade
Summary: Who is better? Altair or Ezio. It was the ultimate question." Desmond ponders his Ancestors after the Templars defeat followind Assassins creed 3. Read and Review.


Duality

Don't read this unless you have played the second game…there are spoilers. Minor ones, but still spoilers. This is set after AC3. Excludes the possibility of another Ancestor being playable in the next game.

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It was strange to compare his ancestors.

They were related, obviously, and both assassins, but were as different as they were alike. Desmond sometimes wondered what it was that made them so different, genetics, the time frame or maybe it was just who they were. He had often tried to decide who was better but he had never quite come to a honest, and completely true, conclusion. Once he made up his mind, he would always change it and so on and so forth.

Altair or Ezio. It was the ultimate question… and one he couldn't answer.

Throughout all his years as an assassin, through the fight with the Templars and their allies, discovering what it was that that strange woman from the Vault had warned him about, he had always pondered the start of it all. That is, the start of his involvement in the battle, and it always came back to the Animus. The first time he had entered that enigmatic machine had sealed his future…it had been the start of everything and he knew that he had been changed because of it. It had been Altair that he had lived as first and, truth be told, he _still_ didn't quite understand the assassin. Then it had been Ezio, the womanising young man that had been so very different from himself, open and carefree, at least for the first seventeen years of his life.

The bleeding effect.

He never had to learn their skills himself, instead he could assimilate them in a matter of days, and he supposed his fellow assassin's resented him for it. But it had never been easy. He had had to live their lives experiencing every betrayal, every pain, and, in a way, he supposed he _had_ learnt. He had learnt how to fight with Ezio and how to be humble with Altair. It didn't matter that he had been a unknown visitor, an unknown student. What mattered was that he had put as much hard work into being a assassin as any of his brothers and sisters.

They could be so similar, he had found, both were the best assassin's of their day, wearing white and red and silver. With metal fastenings adorning the cloth, hiding and aiding their deadly activities; arm guards

forged with elaborate patterns that somehow avoided peoples eyes as they moved through cities. Blood red cloth tied casually around their middle, the dark colour contrasting with the pureness of the white of their robes and somehow escaping the city guards suspicious notice. Combat skills to rival any soldier who dared call themselves the best, a deadly dance only they knew the steps to.

They both had hidden blades, they both killed Templars, they had both once held a piece of Eden…

And yet…

They were so phenomenally different. While Altair was deceptively calm, never losing control, always remaining the cold and watchful assassin, Ezio was quick to lose his temper. He would funnel all his frustration into his voice, anger hot and white, as if he wanted the whole world to know his pain and suffer for it… but Altair funnelled his anger into his hidden blade, striking with the ferocity of a avenging angel; while outwardly appearing perfectly composed. He remembered the first time Ezio had spoke out in anger, the way he screamed at the people of his home city, and how disconcerting it had been. Altair had never lost his temper, even when faced with the betrayal of his Master he had stayed focused.

It had intrigued him.

The differences…yes there were more. So many more. Ezio was a womaniser, Desmond had lost count of the amount of women he had been with over his life, but Altair had been true only to the woman he had loved, as if he couldn't comprehend a meaningless fling. Ezio joked about the women he had been with, talking about his latest 'conquest' but you wouldn't catch Altair saying anything so flippantly, or at all. He was too respectful, holding a woman's honour in the highest regard, so much that he would feel anger when he saw men mistreating their wives. So much that he wouldn't understand the nature of his descendent.

Then there was the way they acted.

Ezio was a noble, all self importance and confidence, used to walking with his head held high, mockingly hiding in plain sight, while Altair had more humble roots and was more comfortable walking with his head bowed, making people overlook him when they really shouldn't. Desmond had, at first, found this odd as it seemed to him to be in conflict with the assassins assertive and slightly arrogant nature but as the memories moved on he learned that Altair was just a great actor; changing from a 'holy' man to a master assassin in the blink of an eye. He used the crowd to hide as well as gather intelligence having the ability to literally brush shoulders with his target without them knowing he was there. It was his mastery over this ability that Desmond had always envied. Altair could become invisible without even appearing to try.

But Ezio…

Well, he too had his contacts but he seemed to take advantage of the crowd more than blend with them. True to his noble roots, he always thought himself above the crowd and so got his information from his friends instead of 'walking among the people' and hired those he deemed useful to distract any guards…yes, he played and manipulated the crowd well. The lofty and purely _Ezio _way in which he acted when among the people never ceased to make Desmond smile. Although he preferred Altair's way of blending seamlessly into any environment, he loved the way Ezio just _couldn't_ appear invisible, he walked with a air of superiority, without a care in the world…as if he was the centre of his universe. It was amazing how well it worked and Desmond knew that it was a skill that no one else, even Altair, could replicate.

It was brilliant.

Still, he knew that _both_ Altair and Ezio walked in a way that just screamed dangerous when they were not blended (yet another similarity). Altair had this smug, smooth and agile way of walking that Ezio seemed to of inherited, arms always seeming to be poised ready to attack. The only thing was that Ezio's half cloak thing was always in the way, slightly inhibiting the affect, but nonetheless, it had taken Desmond _years_ to perfect the walk.

And then there was the way they spoke.

While Altair's speech had always been elaborate and fluid, Ezio had not used the drawn out way of speaking that his ancestor did, but his Italian accent still had the same smoothness of tone, the words flowing into each other with the soft twists and meanders of a river. However, again, there were differences. Like the way Altair didn't have a clear accent, he didn't sound middle eastern but neither did he sound foreign…yet another way he blended in, making certain his tone of voice could not give him away. Yet Ezio never tried to train his accent of his voice; separating himself from his ancestor. And while the assassin from the crusades never allowed emotion to show prominently in his voice, the nobleman did not attempt to hide his anger or discontent. He loved how Ezio kept his sense of self, refusing to become just another person but…

Desmond found he preferred Altair's voice best, the Italian accent sometimes confused him, and he liked the way the assassins words flowed, drifting like the wind, unpredictable but always, infuriatingly, calm.

So, yes, he did not know which one was better. Was it the assassin from the crusades? The epitome of experience and wisdom, calm and ghost like; able to disappear within a fraction of a second. Legendary among both Templar and assassin for the eagle like precision of which he struck with and the almost supernatural quality to the way he appeared and disappeared- the apparently demonic way he fought. Nameless to everyone except the assassins he called family.

Or…

Was it the renaissance nobleman? Elegance, confidence, walking with a step that to others may give of a holier-than-thou attitude. The one that cared, at first, only for revenge and not for the good of others and was lofty due to the nature of his upbringing. Avenging and dangerous, a persistent shadow that seemed to follow his enemies wherever they went, never relenting until they were dead but learning, in the end, that sometimes he had to let go.

He supposed he would never decide. He had lived both their lives and while they were not faultless, there was nothing they did that he would of done differently…they really were the best assassins of their age.

But he was the assassin now.

He was the one that stopped the Templars. The one that used the famous skills of the assassin order, passed down through the generations by the men and women that had served it. He had only became an assassin because of the skills created by the bleeding effect. The skills he learned from his ancestors. It was because of the assassins of old, because of Altair _and_ Ezio, that the world had been saved. That some semblance of peace had been achieved. It was because of his experience in the Animus that he had become a fully fledged assassin; taught by the best.

And so, no, he could not and would not say who was better.

Because he had both of them to thank for that.

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Hello, this is my first venture into the Assassin's Creed section, I just finished the second game a few weeks ago. 4 days after I got it. I'm proud. I wrote this soon after but didn't upload it…I thought that this had to be done, if not by me then someone else, to explore the differences between Altair and Ezio. I think its obvious that I like Altair best (he has the smexiest voice lol) but I did try to make it more even. Sorry but Ezio can irritate me, he's not as agile as Altair, I don't know why but he's awkward to move around sometimes. Also, the first time he shouted made me jump…after Altair's everlasting calm I was not expecting that. He also took like, what, twenty three years to kill ten people? Weirdo… Still, I hope you enjoyed this, I'm not that happy about the end, but my mind didn't think far enough ahead to plan how I would end it. I also tried to make Desmond more important than everyone else seems to make him…he's the assassin now, after all. And he had one of the best last lines ever. What the ****? Brilliant.

Sorry if I'm rambling. Read and review please.


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